MOTHER DIVINES' Writes Robert Weisbrot, Author of the Book

"FATHER DIVINE the Struggle for Racial Equality"




April 21, 1984 A.D. 38 F. D.

Mr. Robert Weisbrot
Asst. Professor Of History
Colby College
Waterville, Maine 04901

My dear Mr. Weisbrot:

I wish to acknowledge receipt of your letter of April 2, wherein you requested photographs for use in the reprinting of your book on FATHER DIVINE. I cannot grant your request under any circumstances and I regret that I allowed you to use Me to get the photographs that you did for the first printing of the book, because it gives the reader the impression that the Peace Mission is somewhat endorsing the contents of it.

MOTHER DIVINE

MOTHER DIVINEp

 

I was hopeful that you could produce something I would wholeheartedly, or at least with a qualified explanation, endorse, so that the public could have factual information on the Civil Rights aspect of FATHER DIVINE's Work and Mission. You led Me to believe that the book you authored: "FATHER DIVINE the Struggle for Racial Equality" would fill this need, because you had supposedly read the voluminous and documented history of FATHER DIVINE and the Peace Mission Movement from The New Day, as well as researched into the facts and situation of the time and people involved. However, the truth is I AM appalled by your presentation of FATHER DIVINE as a flamboyant, egotistic, self- seeking man, not even a good man with pure motives, but a man who has used his inspiration, genius and love for people only to exploit them from every angle to satisfy his selfish lust for power and wealth.

You have taken the prejudiced and erroneous research of writers before you as factual. You have not done the needed original research on FATHER DIVINE; if you had you would have told the truth, that FATHER DIVINE's Name has always been Reverend Major J. DIVINE, which the Library of Congress has ratified in their records. You could have recorded for history that all the allegations that HIS Name was George Baker have never been proven in any Court of Law, and that none of the extensive research through the years by numerous qualified people has produced any documents of any kind to prove it. Instead, you have not only written it as gospel truth and taken it as fact, but you have built on it and stated as factual other unfounded events in what you term His early life. May I state here for the record that never in all My personal experience have I heard of any blood relatives of FATHER DIVINE. Since 1965, I might add, there has been absolutely no one who has come to Me claiming to be a legal heir to FATHER DIVINE's estate. Of course you know FATHER DIVINE had no estate and there is legal proof of this.

You started your writing on the premise that FATHER DIVINE is a mortal human being, and you construct every event in HIS Personal Life and ministry to fit that mold. You have used your profession as an accredited historian to indelibly stamp in the minds of your readers lies, assumptions, innuendoes and half truths which, when you mix them with all the truth and factual information you have recorded, the reader is given a perverted erroneous and very confused concept of FATHER DIVINE, HIS work and HIS Mission. You cannot analyze or define, nor can you measure the Reverend Major J. DIVINE with the measure of a finite man.

Not only have you highly disrespected FATHER DIVINE, but you have lowrated every follower, as well as Myself. What kind of a person would follow and be so loyal to an individual such as you describe FATHER DIVINE to be? and what kind of a person must I be to marry such an individual? You have insulted our faith and overlooked the fact that what you say of us is not compatible nor does it have any logic in light of the unequaled reputation of the followers for integrity, honesty and virtue, and we come, as you say, from every social strata of life.

Now it is commonly known that literally thousands, even millions, have declared that FATHER DIVINE is GOD. Judaism has been expecting the Meshiach for centuries, the Christian world say Jesus Christ is coming any moment. You could just as well have begun your research on the premise that FATHER DIVINE is a unique and superior individual, for science surely supports the fact that humanity has evolved and developed through the ages. Highly evolved individuals have always led and pioneered the advancement and progress of civilization. FATHER DIVINE HIMSELF has stated that eventually "Mankind will become to be the universal personification of GOD", which means individuals who have demonstrated supernatural power emerge from the limitations of their human birth to be naturally what man has previously considered supernatural. There is voluminous scientific data available today to substantiate this possibility.

It is proven that there must always be an advanced One to lift the masses that will follow.
FATHER DIVINE has said:

'You are obliged to have faith in Something above that of yourself as a person and deny yourself to an extent that your very conscious thinking will condemn all corruption, falsity and inequality within yourself.'

Until such a superior being comes, as they ultimately will come if they have not already come in your way of thinking, you could have judged and compared with CHRIST as HE came in HIS day, and considered how HE would have come in this dispensation. You could just as well have done your research from this point of view, rather than portraying FATHER DIVINE as an extremely underprivileged man. You could have asked yourself, if the Meshiach or CHRIST came, where would HE go? What would HE do? What would HE teach us? What would HE be like as a Person, HIS personality, HIS nature, HIS characteristics? You could have done your research on the basis of, "Is this GOD or man? not, "HE is a man, a megalomaniac, and I will prove it." A megalomaniac according to Webster is one who is possessed with delusions of glandular and wealth. FATHER DIVINE has given the people a vision of grandeur and wealth for everyone, and without it civilization will perish. All civilization in the past has been based on some philosophical or religious thought or belief system, and mankind's progress is tantamount to their spiritual concept and aspiration. You cannot write this out of existence.

Your ignorance of basic religious and spiritual fact is absolutely unacceptable as a supposed historian of this American culture. It is unthinkable that you could be any kind of an authority in this country, where the concept of GOD revealing HIMSELF to the common people is the fundamental premise that gave birth to our Constitution and gave us a democratic republic governmentally that is responsible for the advanced age we are living in.

You have debased the spiritual quickening of the Holy Ghost and portrayed that which is most sacred and necessary for the redemption and rebirth of man as sensual and for sexual gratification. If the splitting of the atom in physical science could release the power that has changed the course of humanity and literally lifted man's horizons to infinitude, does it not stand to reason that the mind of man, making the rightful contact with the Creator of atomic power, could split the atoms in man and release the power that gives him victory over his lower nature and lifts his horizons to realize the infinite potentials that are inherent in man?

When anyone has this experience, that is, of being truly quickened and awakened within by the Holy Spirit, they are in truth born again and are new creatures. Money is no longer their god; it becomes what is really is, a means of exchange, GOD as their Blesser; working and living in harmony with His Law is the Source of their material supply. FATHER DIVINE has taught HIS followers not to hoard up money, but put it to an exchange. All the money you need will be there when you need it if you keep it flowing. It will be just like the air we breathe, we inhale and we exhale, we do not carry a paper bag around with a supply of air in case we run out.

The followers of FATHER DIVINE have lived by the principle, "You have to give out to take in" and have contributed the money they earned and did not need to take care of all of their rightful and legitimate responsibilities, to the Churches and the Cooperative System of the Peace Mission Movement. FATHER DIVINE has never taken a penny for HIMSELF, Me or anyone else. HE condescended to burden HIMSELF with the spiritual well-being of HIS followers and therefore advised them on how to spend their money wisely, teaching the under- privileged that as good citizens they had the responsibility of handling it righteously. If the billions allocated to slum areas and under-privileged people by the Johnson Administration's Poverty Program for the Great Society and other Social Welfare programs in different administrations would have had the caring and selfless leadership that FATHER DIVINE gave HIS followers, we would not have experienced the failure of this sincere effort of man to lift his fellow man.

The reason why it is said erroneously so often that FATHER DIVINE's followers give HIM their money is because everything is done in HIS Name, for HIS honor and glory. They find happiness and fulfillment in giving of themselves and their means to glorify the Name of FATHER and MOTHER DIVINE.

It is reasonable to be dedicated and consecrated to a Name that represents Something, Holiness and Virtue, the Standard that brings an abundant life of Peace and prosperity; whereas their individual names mean nothing, no more than the names in many denominational churches where the donor's name is placed on their gift. That is why followers have hid their ego and identity in FATHER DIVINE and it appears that HE, Personally, owns all the wealth that the followers enjoy; but in reality neither FATHER DIVINE nor I have any personal funds, bank account, bonds or investments of any kind. We do not legally own any property, not even the cars we ride in. The Deusenberg car that has received much publicity because FATHER DIVINE rode in it a great deal and it was custom built in 1937 at a cost of many thousands of dollars was paid for by a devoted follower. For the record I state that the title was in the name of the follower who purchased it.

FATHER DIVINE condescended to enjoy the use of it, for it was convenient as a traveling office and had a removable top so HE could be seen in the many parades the followers had for Righteous purposes. The car was sold by the owner's son who had rightly had the title transferred to him. The proceeds are in his bank account and he has the sole direction over it, even though the money is still being used for the advancement of FATHER's work and mission as the Deusenberg was. Today that same car has been restored and is said to be for sale for at least $175,000 as FATHER DIVINE's Deusenberg Likewise, of the more than two dozen properties owned by followers in Ulster County upstate New York, all but one of them have been sold. Every follower who had an equity has received it, and many times it was double their investment. Even followers who had defected from the Movement, received their money.

Furthermore, if FATHER DIVINE was after the people's money, would HE have put a ban on soliciting money? Prove to us that a collection plate has ever been passed in a recognized Church of the Peace Mission or assembly of followers of FATHER DIVINE throughout the world. And would FATHER DIVINE have successfully instituted celibacy among HIS followers if HE was primarily interested in wealth and power? You know that FATHER DIVINE and the Movement underwent many stringent investigations by the FBI and others that have proven HE was not interested in money; personal power or sex.

As a historian, your book, "FATHER DIVINE the Struggle for Racial Equality" could have documented for the people who did not have the privilege of living in that era the countless events and courageous steps taken by FATHER DIVINE and HIS followers as HE pioneered the advancement in integration that is being enjoyed today. Your book is a misnomer. All of your analysis and opinions you have injected and verbalized mean little or nothing because for many reasons you are not qualified to make the statements you have made. Furthermore, if you had been interested in documenting the truth, when I requested to review the manuscript before it was published, you would have granted Me this privilege and been grateful for My opinion.

You fall in the category of man in his secular humanistic ideology who thinks he is supreme and the earth is his domain to reign over and control the inhabitants therefore. He has through the ages subdued the CHRIST wherever and whenever it manifests itself in the people. The carnal, human mind of man is enmity against GOD, it is hostile to innocent goodness, because it is not subject to the Law of GOD and never can be. The Christians in the past have condemned the Jews for crucifying Jesus. It was not the Jews as a people, but it was the impersonal, carnal human mind operating in hostility against Godliness.

"The pen is mightier than the sword" is a true saying, and with the pen you, Mr. Weisbrot, and all like you, have crucified mercilessly the CHRIST as it manifests Itself in the Fathership degree in FATHER DIVINE and as it manifests Itself in the true and faithful followers. Therefore every statement that FATHER DIVINE made about Sara Harris and her book "FATHER DIVINE, Holy Husband" when HE cursed her and all who would read and believe her lies, applies to you and the readers of your book. The enormity of the detrimental effect on society, yea civilization, is tantamount to a nuclear holocaust. In fact, it is all that people like yourself have done to destroy the faith that gives the moral fibre to humanity that has caused the deterioration of world conditions today. This is evident in the barbarism, terrorism, the amorality, the hopelessness and the real possibility of germ warfare and nuclear war, not to overlook the cosmic forces of nature that are working inharmoniously to man's existence on the earth, and will continue to do so in an ever greater degree of destruction if he does not reverse his pattern of thinking and acting.

Without sympathy for the judgment of Almighty GOD that you have brought upon yourself unless you repent and make amends for the diabolical way you have treated the sacred Coming and Ministry of FATHER DIVINE in your book, I Am,

Yours very sincerely,

Mrs. M. J. Divine

(Better known as MOTHER DIVINE)

 

P. S. Enclosed is a copy of Reverend Adam Clayton Powell's statement about FATHER DIVINE in his article in the Ebony Magazine of November 1951. This is a valuable evaluation of FATHER DIVINE from a contemporary and fellow minister of the CHRISTIAN Gospel that merits a true historian's consideration.

 

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The following are the two articles mentioned in the above letter.